The Shadow's Legacy
by Fireblazezz
Summary: It all started with the kidnapping of a friend, but the question is how it will end? Adventure theme story for you who love Amy (and her friends, of course.) Some more familiar faces might appear, and some unfamiliar as well... Rated T for DA ADVENTURA! (tragic, hurt, possibly violence and death; romance is not impossible either)
1. Cream the Captive

**Another Amy Rosey-mainie-characterie story! Yes! :D But just like "Brainwashed" this story is not a super lovable and adorable romance… it's adventure themed^^ (Sorry?) But I have a weird brain, so I might change my mind and add romance to the story in the future… we'll see! And most importantly, a story is nothing without its readers, so if you think that this is completely worthless and disgusting and horrible (please tell me if you do) then of course I'll do my best to change it!**

**All kinds of reviews and comments are appreciated! **

**Love you, and thanks for reading this, if only this far. I really hope you'll enjoy.**

* * *

**Cream the Captive**

The evening was chilly.

The cool breeze brushed Shadow's skin, whispering and howling in the grass and above and through the trees far below the steep hill. For how long hadn't he been listening to this sound, back in the days and up till the present? How it resembled freedom and wilderness, but at the same time reminded him of loneliness and sorrow.

Shadow gazed out over the landscape; the hill, the field, the forest below, the mountains far away in the distance, and the shining golden horizon above the distant sea. The sunset was fierce and it colored the clear sky flaming red and reflected itself in the deep sea, making the great water seem even more powerful, mysterious and erratic than it already was.

Shadow stood motionless and silent while his thoughts wandered far away. The evening was chilly, indeed. The black hedgehog didn't move a muscle until a familiar voice suddenly broke the silence from behind: "Well, well, well. Look who it is, standing her all by himself, all alone," the voice said.

Shadow tilted his head slightly so that he could see in the corner of his eye who it was. His visitor sneered as he continued: "Long time no see, Shadow."

* * *

_A week later…_

It was in the middle of the day, and a happy Amy Rose was on her way to Cream's house, where she and Tails had been invited over for tea; Sonic would've been invited too, but it is hard to give an invitation to someone who's running around the planet all the time, and is not easy to get in touch with.

Amy frowned a little at the thought of Sonic; he had seemed to be a little on edge lately. It was probably because of the fact that nor Eggman or anyone else had caused any trouble for a while now.

Amy sighed and gazed up into the sky as she walked; she herself thought that it was rather nice to be able to relax and take it easy for a while, to be able to hang out with friends or just chill out, but obviously that was out of the question for her blue hedgehog friend. He always wanted action and adventures, not laziness and boredom. And still he manages to keep good contact with his friends, Amy thought, which is rather impressive. Or maybe not, since he was the planet's hero, after all.

The female hedgehog kicked a stone as she turned right and passed a hill; she _would _make Sonic go out with her one of these days. Someday she would, for real. Amy started smirking and a faint blush appeared on her cheeks as she started fantasizing about that one day: She would be elegantly dressed in a beautiful new rosy dress, a pink shirt, shining boots and a new headband, decorated with pretty flowers, and she would meet up with Sonic in Twinkle Park, and he would smile and wave at her, and then she would run into his arms and…

"Amy!"

Amy snapped out of her daydreaming and found herself standing maybe thirty meters away from Cream and Vanilla's house, and to her surprise she was encountered by a horror-struck Tails who came running up to her with a wild face expression. "Amy!" he repeated as he stopped in front of her. "Oh, I'm glad you're here..!"

"What?" Amy looked at him in confusion, and when she glanced over his shoulder she could see an upset Vanilla sitting by the doorstep, hiding her face in her hands and crying. "What's happened? Where's Cr…" Amy interrupted herself, and her eyes widened when she realized.

Tails seemed to have read her thoughts, because he nodded sadly. "Yes," he said. "Cream's been kidnapped. There's no evidence, but I bet my tails that it was Eggman," he continued.

Like always. Amy felt the anger rise in her stomach and she clenched her fists. _That goddamn eggbrain…! And here I thought that we finally were gonna have some time for some tea. _She shook her head and looked at Tails, dead serious; "Where's Sonic?"

Tails shook his head and flung his arms out. "Sonic could be anywhere!"

Amy stomped the ground in frustration. "_Aaargh! _Where is that hedgehog when you need him?!" she exclaimed irritably. Really, how could he be running around his daily routes at a time like this? And he's the one who wanted some action…

"Oh my, what should we do, you two?" It was Vanilla who had spoken through her sobbing, and now she was looking at Amy with watery eyes, desperately searching for help from the pink hedgehog.

Amy closed her eyes tightly and remained silent for a few seconds, before she came to the obvious conclusion, and she opened her eyes and met Tails and Vanilla with a determined and straight face. "It's crystal clear!" she exclaimed. "If Eggman has kidnapped Cream, and he's surely about to use her for some idiotic take-over-Mobius purpose, then we must save her!"

Amy looked at the other two. "Right, Tails?"

At first, her two-tailed friend seemed nothing but absent-minded, but then he pulled himself together and met Amy with the same confidence which she herself hopefully had and replied: "You're right, Amy. Of course you are; we will save Cream before Eggman gets the chance to get on with his plan, whatever it is."

Amy nodded shortly. "That's right." She smiled at him. "I knew you would agree, Tails."

Tails returned her smile, but before he was able to say anything, Vanilla interrupted him with a rather concerned look on her face. "Are you sure you want to do this?" she asked anxiously. "Maybe we should wait for Sonic…"

"Waiting for Sonic can take forever!" Amy interrupted. "We don't have time for that. Cream might be in danger as we speak!"

"Yeah, I agree with Amy," Tails said. "We should at least get to Eggman's Headquarters and check things out first." He walked up to Vanilla with a reassuring smile on his lips; "Don't worry. I promise we will bring Cream back. But if Sonic happens to show up while we're gone, you can tell him about all this, and I'm sure he'll come help."

"That's right," Amy nodded and turned around, prepared to set off. "We will make sure Cream won't get hurt, Vanilla," she said, and she and Tails started walking in quick pace. "Just you wait, she'll be back before you know it!" she called over her shoulder as she and Tail's started running, and they barely heard when Vanilla called after them to be careful.

This might've been a stupid choice, Amy was fully aware of that, and so was Tails, but they couldn't just sit around and do nothing while their friend was in danger.

* * *

They'd already been running for a while when something struck Amy, something that she maybe should've thought of before, and she turned to Tails who was running beside her. "Have you got any idea of where Eggman's Headquarters might be?" she asked.

To her relief, Tails nodded. "Do you remember my CEL?"

CEL. C.E.L…. Oh yeah, the Chaos Emerald Locator that they used back on Chris' planet, which did exactly what its name said. "Yeah, what about it?"

"As you know, it locates the Chaos Emeralds specific locations," Tails said and took it out – from nowhere – and held it up in front of her face, "and since this is Eggman we're talking about, if I recall things correctly, then he should still have at least one Chaos Emerald since Sonic's last fight with him, which means—"

"That you'll be able to track him down since he probably keeps the Chaos Emeralds in Headquarters?" Even Amy was able to figure it out from there. "Great, now we have a location!" She felt her hopes rise and even convinced herself to smile a little.

"Yeah, let's just hope that the Auto Reconstruction of the X Tornado is complete by now," Tails remarked as they closed in on his house.

They ran into Tail's garage and found the great, shiny – Tails had just been washing it – elegant X Tornado stand as if waiting for them to hop in, in front of them. It all went very fast; Tails hopped into the driver's seat and instructed Amy to sit behind him, he fumbled a little with the controls, pushed a few buttons and pulled a few levers – something Amy wasn't able to follow – and then he looked at a screen with some weird coordination texting, and he sighed in relief and turned his head and said reassuringly: "It's alright, Amy. The update is complete. Otherwise we'd have to wait at least a few hours before I'd be able to cancel it properly, without the whole thing blowing to pieces," he added to himself as he started the engine.

Amy watched as the ceiling opened above them, and then after a few moments of loud noises, the X Tornado set off up into the sky, and they were on their way. _So far so good,_ she thought as she glanced down at the landscape. _I just hope that Cream's alright._

* * *

"Are we there yet?" Amy asked when they'd been flying for over twenty minutes. She'd expected them to be there much sooner, since Tails claimed to have increased the machine's maximum speed.

"Nearly," Tails replied distractedly, as he constantly stared at the CEL.

_Yeah, that's what you've been saying for the last fifteen minutes. _"Maybe we can take a shortcut or something?" Amy suggested.

Tails blinked at her. "Shortcut?" he repeated. "We're flying the straight route towards Eggman's Headquarters. There are no shortcuts, we're _on _the shortcut," he remarked.

Amy sat back in her seat with a sigh. She gazed outside, and then after a few moments, something caught her eye; there was a strangely odd distance to that tall cliff over there, she'd noticed. They'd been flying straight towards it for a while now, and they'd still not moved closer to it at all.

Amy frowned; that was really weird. She leaned forward to the back of Tails seat. "Hey Tails, where exactly does the CEL tell us to go?" she asked.

"Straight up ahead," Tails replied calmly. "Towards that cliff over there."

"But we've been going that way for a while now," Amy said hesitantly, "and we've still not gotten any closer."

That seemed to stir her fuzzy friend's mind; he frowned and gazed at the huge cliff with a suspicious look. "Now that I think about it…"

Amy waited patiently as he rooted around among the controls, but she was starting to get nervous now. She looked outside and narrowed her eyes; and then she thought that for some reason, the area around the cliff was slightly indistinct and kind of blurred…

As Amy's worry slowly got the better of her, an alarm suddenly started screeching, and she gazed at Tails for answers. And to her dismay, her friend looked startled, even frightened as he stared down at the screen and logged himself into all of his complex systems; "What is this?" he exclaimed.

"What is it?!"

"The alarm just called because that cliff over there is surrounded by some sort of visual force field that tricks the vision…"

_Tricks the vison…? _Amy's eyes widened. _The cliff! _"Tails, the cliff! _Look out!"_

Tails reaction was fast, but it was still a few moments too late, and the following happened very fast: They must've entered and broken the force field, because suddenly – after a blur of dimness – their vision became stable again, but as it did, they also realized that they had indeed been going straight towards the huge cliff all the time, but they'd simply been deceived by the force field. And by now that huge cliff was only about thirty meters away from them, and no matter how much Tails desperately veered or how much Amy screamed in terror, half of the X Tornado still crashed straight through the giant rock, and the poor flying machine and the poor creatures that were inside, helplessly dived downwards in terrifying speed; the left wing was broken and the side was overwhelming with smoke, and they dived through clouds and dust as they fell.

Tails shouted something but Amy was unable to hear because of the roaring engine and the alarming alarm, and in panic Amy covered her ears and shut her eyes tightly before the X Tornado finally slammed onto the ground with the strongest impact and the loudest and longest crashing sound she'd ever heard, before Tail's screamed and everything went black.

* * *

**This was very sudden, Cream's kidnapping, I know, but I just wanted to get the story going… (I know it's kind of original and lacks imagination) Which is probably the worst kind of habit for an author xD**

**There might be more to this than what have met the eye up till now, and I really hope that you'll give this story a chance… if not, then I am grateful for you to have read it, if only this far.**

**Note: The kidnapping of Cream is not the main plot.**

**Thank you a lot! Have a great day! :D (Night?)**


	2. Blessing in Disguise

**Note: The rescuing of Cream is ****not**** the main plot.**

* * *

**Blessing in Disguise**

Everything was quiet.

Where was she? Was she alive? Dead? Where was Tails? Did they make it? Her whole body was aching, so she supposed that at least she wasn't dead yet.

Amy had tried to open and close her eyes a few times, but it didn't seem to make any difference; it was still too dark to see anything. She gasped in pain when she tried to move her arm; just like the rest of her, it was under the heavy pressure of a rock.

She was buried under rocks. But she couldn't be too deep down, could she? If that was the case, she was pretty sure that she'd been squashed by now. But everything was still dark, she couldn't see at all and there were no openings…

_Oh god, I'm getting claustrophobia, _Amy thought as she lay there. _Come on, Amy, pull yourself together! Think… _

…. … … … … … … She couldn't think. There was nothing to think about; she had no options to choose between. _Okay, calm down, _she told herself and tried to take a deep breath, which resulted in a dusty cough. _Up, _she thought. _I need to find out where up is… and to do that… that's right, spit! _

Amy anxiously moistened her mouth and spit; just for it to fall back right on her. Amy narrowed her eyes in disgust, but at least she'd found out which way was up. _You're a genius, Amy. A freakin' genius. _

She carefully twisted, pulled and pushed, and somehow she managed to get her arms loose, and then she carefully stretched it upwards, in between a rock, grabbed another and slowly pulled herself upwards; she couldn't help but whimper in pain when her legs finally broke free from the heaviest rocks on the bottom.

Then she stretched out her other arm and grabbed the next thing she was able to get a hold on, and she swore that she could see a glimpse of sunlight above her. This incited her to keep on working, and she climbed the rocks painfully slow, until her arms were numb. At the final spur, she forcefully broke her way out of her rocky burial, and with a relieved and exhausted sigh she fell onto the ground and just lay there to catch her breath.

Until she remembered that she still had a friend that hadn't showed up yet.

Amy jumped to her feet and tried to sound as calm as possible when she called out his name. "Tails?" … No response.

"Tails?!" her voice echoed against the walls of the rocks, and when Amy finally decided to look around herself and above herself, she realized that she was standing on the bottom of a canyon.

"How the _hell _did we manage to end up in a canyon?" Amy muttered as she gazed upwards. "That force field or whatever must've had a big impression on our eyes. Fooled by a cliff, who would've thought…" she added quietly to herself.

She looked around some more; to her left, the X Tornado was leaning against the walls, in the worst kind of shape Amy could've ever imagined. All the glasses and windows were crushed, and Amy imaged how they must've been tossed out of there by the impact and the rolling. The machine's left wing and part of the side was completely torn off, and the remaining parts didn't look too good. Frankly, it looked like it would never be able to fly again. Poor Tails would get a heart attack if he saw this…

_Holy god, Tails! _Amy almost slapped herself and immediately started searching the grounds, and her heart rate went up fast as she did it. "Tails!" she shouted. _"Tails!" Oh shit, oh god, oh no, oh no oh no oh no…! Please don't be dead, Tails, please, please please please please…_

Her panic-struck worries were interrupted when she thought that she heard a faint groan; Amy spun around and hectically searched the ground from where it came; _there! _Her heart took a leap. She'd caught a glimpse of orange fur.

Amy stumbled over there, sank to her knees and dug for her dear life. Or Tails' dear life. Her heart hammered in her chest as she pulled and pushed rocks and constantly called out Tails' name, and finally, after God knows how long, she _finally_ got him out.

"_Tails!" _she whispered hoarsely.

Tails weakly opened his big terrified eyes and met her gaze, and despite the pain and shock, you could easily see how relieved he was. "I knew you'd find me, Amy," he replied through a few hacky coughs.

Amy tried to smile, but it was hard, and she didn't know if she should cry or shout; she hadn't fully realized how happy she was that Tails was alive. "Of course I'd find you," she just replied before her voice betrayed her as she observed her poor friend; he looked like a shaken, fuzzy and ruffled ball of dusty and bruised up fur, and his tails looked the worst of all, twisted in a weird angle, even for a pair of tails.

When she mentioned them, Tails face cramped up as if he was just reminded of that he was in pain. "They hurt a lot," he tried to toughen himself up, but Amy'd known him for too long not to be able to see through his acts. "I think I might've broken them…"

Amy couldn't help but wonder how you broke your tail; were there even bones in them? But Tails probably knew more about his body and bones than she did, so she didn't comment. Now when the rush of joy had went away, all she felt now was pity for the beaten up fox. To cheer him up, she gave him a reassuring smile. "Don't worry, Tails. I'll make sure you get better."

Tails gave her an upset reply. "No, we can't wait for my recovery! Cream is in danger, we must get to—"

"You're of no help to Cream in your current state," Amy interrupted. "We would never make it to Headquarters unless I left you here, and _that _I tell you,I sure as hell will _never _do!"

Tails just looked at her, almost pleadingly, but Amy knew that he knew that he too had known her for too long not to know how stubborn she was. He just smiled. "Thank you, Amy," he said quietly.

Amy beamed at him. "That's what friends are for, when we don't have our silly blue hero around."

* * *

In the later circumstances, staying put and putting up a little camp in the canyon proved itself to be a good idea as the night came. The canyon's shelter and protection was rather safe in the dark.

Amy had moved Tails to the wall of the cliff and pushed over a few rocks to give them some lee. She collected a few dry branches – which were not that hard to find – and managed to make a fire by the lee side to give them warmth. She then went into the X Tornado and pulled out blankets, bandages, meds and even some alcohol to tend to Tail's wounds (they wouldn't sleep in the X Tornado because of the smoke and the dangerous chemicals.) She also fetched the small amount of food that was still edible and brought it to the fireplace where Tails lay. Luckily he had the CEL on him, and it was probably the only thing that still was in good shape, so they would still be able to continue later.

They helped each other to pour alcohol on the other's bruises and wounds, to hinder infections, and then Amy wrapped the bandages around Tails' broken tails. Then she buried him in blankets, and the two of them just sat there and gazed at the fire for a long time.

"Do you really think that we'll find Eggman's headquarters?" Amy suddenly asked, without taking her eyes off of the fire.

Tails didn't answer at once. "I don't know," he replied. "To be honest, he might just keep the Chaos Emeralds in one of his minor bases… But does it really matter?" he added after a while. "It's not like we have any other option but to follow the CEL.

Amy took her while too, before she answered: "You're right."

A few moments pause. "About that," Tails said. "The CEL has been reacting strongly to this place, so that might just mean that Eggman's base is nearby."

"That might be true," was all Amy replied.

Then they fell silent. After a while, Tails started yawning. "S… sorry Amy, but… I think I'm going to call it a day."

Amy nodded and dragged a few blankets towards her. "Yeah, me too."

Tails yawned yet another time and curled up like a fur ball in his nest of blankets. "Goodnight, Amy," he said tiredly.

"Night, Tails. Sleep tight," Amy said, and soon she listened to his calm and regular breathings.

Now that things had finally settled down a little, she wondered what kind of plan Eggman had come up with this time, and what he would want to use Cream for. The last thing she thought of before she fell into slumber was that she promised herself to save Cream and go back home with her and Tails, no matter what.

* * *

Tails was the one to wake up first. He stretched out his thin body and gave out a lasting yawn before he tried to move his body. Both his arms and legs felt completely healed by now, it was only his tails that still hurt. But, he'd been through worse. And so had Amy, he told himself as he cast a glance at his female friend. He would let her sleep.

The fire had gone out long ago, but there was really no need to light it up again since they would probably be moving on today. So instead Tails went sightseeing; there were definitely a lot of interesting things one could find in a canyon like this.

Indeed there were; he found fascinating and rare rocks and chemicals, marks on the walls and footprints which proved that there had been people here before them, even if it was a long time ago. There were even writings on the walls: _"Fell down into darkness, woke up in the morning down here with a broken leg," _the first one said. A couple of meters onward, the writings continued: _"There is no food, I think I am going to die…", "I've lost feeling in my leg, and I'm getting dizzy… I've been trying to find a way out, but there are just so many paths…". _

Tails could agree with that; as he looked around, the canyon soon split into several disorienting paths that all looked the same. He felt his hopes fade as he discovered this, so he continued to search for the writings. He searched for a long while without success, and when he instead found a dark dry pool of blood on the ground, he almost suspected that the person who wrote this had died.

"No, he couldn't just have died," Tails told himself strictly. "There must be more…" He continued searching, and just as he was about to give up and go back to Amy, he found the next writing on the wall and anxiously read it out loud: _"I met a person, a traveler, thank god! He took care of my wounded leg, and now we're going to leave this place." _Then there was an arrow that pointed which way to go.

Tails blinked. He hardly believed his eyes; now they wouldn't have to bother to search all the paths in this huge canyon! "This is great," Tails whispered with a wide smile. "Thank you, whoever wrote this," he added quietly to the writings before he quickly turned on his heels to run back to Amy.

"Amy!" he shouted, it was hard to hold it in. "Amy! Amy, I've found—" he began, but his sentence ended abruptly with a confused gasp as he tripped on something hard and fell flat on the ground.

"_Ouch!" _ he groaned and sat up to rub his knee and glared back at the glimmering rock. "What the heck was…?" he trailed off.

Glimmering rock? Tails slowly crawled closer to get a closer look; it could've just been his imagination, but…

Tails eyes widened as he looked down at the unique rock of which he'd stumbled on. "No way…!" he whispered. "First the writings, and now…"

* * *

"_Amy… Amy, hey… Hey, wake up, Amy…"_

The voice was disturbing her sleep, and Amy muttered irritably and pulled up the covers to her ears. _Not now, I'm tired… I'm sleeping…_

"_Amy… Wake up, Amy…"_

Amy groaned as she slowly drifted out of her nice sleep and woke up to look up into Tails face. She blinked drowsily. "Morning… What's up?" she said tiredly.

"Look what I found," was all Tails said, and with a strange look in his eyes, he carefully turned around, grabbed something and held it up in front of her. "Look what I stumbled across."

At first, Amy considered going back to sleep, but when she saw what he was holding in his hands, all she did was stare at it with big eyes. "Oh my god," she whispered.

"I know, right?" Tails replied as he carefully placed the shimmering white Chaos Emerald on the rocky ground between them. "What luck... What if we hadn't crashed down here?"

"Blessing in disguise," Amy replied without taking her eyes off of the emerald.

"You know what," Tails said after a while, "I think that we might have sabotaged Eggman's plans, at least a little."

Amy gave him a questioning look. "How?"

"Well, whatever the plan is, I'm pretty sure that just like the previous times, it has got something to do with the Chaos Emeralds," Tails explained. "So, if we have one, that means Eggman can't get them all, and that might mean that his plan won't succeed. And that might even make it easier for us to get Cream back, maybe even unnoticed!" he added enthusiastically.

Amy just frowned; that might be true, but how did that matter when they were still stuck down here? "Yeah, you might be right, but we still haven't gotten out of here, and as I recently noticed – hopefully you have too – the path divides into more than twenty different ones up ahead!" she pointed out pessimistically.

To her surprise, Tails smirked at her. "That's where you're wrong," he said and suddenly got to his feet, ran up to one of the walls and waved at her to come over.

Amy obeyed and jogged up to him, rather puzzled by now. "What is it?"

"Here." Tails pointed at the wall, and that's when Amy noticed the writings. And after she'd read them up to the arrow message, she finally understood what Tails was getting at, and she looked just as happy as he did now.

"Tails, this is great!" she exclaimed. "You're a genius!"

This made Tails blush and hide his face behind his tails. "Well, uh, I… I didn't really do anything," he stuttered embarrassedly.

Amy was barely listening, but only exclaimed in joy: "Super! Now we can move on!" She turned around to beam at her friend before she started moving in the direction that the arrow pointed to; she was really really eager to get moving now, and Tails was almost left behind.

"W-wait!" he exclaimed behind her. "Shouldn't we bring the blankets? And the food?!"

"I don't think we have neither the time nor the physical strength to carry along those things by ourselves and without the X Tornado," Amy called back over her shoulder. Maybe she shouldn't have mentioned Tails' poor flying machine, because a moment later, she could hear him gasp in shock and terror as he was reminded of his precious soul mate, and then she heard him curse before he finally started to catch up with her.

"Goddammit," he muttered upset to himself as he jogged up behind her. "My beautiful Tornado…!"

Amy smiled nervously and gave him an encouraging pat on his shoulder as he wandered in his dark and sadistic thoughts. "I'm sorry for bringing it up," she apologized. "But let's stick to saving Cream now, alright bud?"

Tails mumbled and muttered for yet another few seconds before he sighed and pulled himself together. "Yeah, of course; Cream is naturally first priority right now. Sorry," he said with a more determined look on his face now.

And the two of them continued following the arrows; there were no messages with texting anymore, not until the arrows had finally, _finally, _to their immense delight, led them to the end of the canyon. There was the last message, which simply said: "_Finally. This is where it ends." _And you could almost sense the relief that lingered in the atmosphere around those letters, as the man/woman who wrote it finally exited the deep and lonely canyon along with his savior. And Amy and Tails were just as delighted and happy like him/her right now.

"Lovely," was all Amy said. "Finally we're out."

"I know." Tails softly closed his eyes and took a deep, refreshing breath before he let out a deep sigh and just listened to the breeze. "Let's go, Amy," he said after they'd been standing in silence for a while, and Amy almost thought that she caught a trace of excitement in his voice.

She nodded. "Yeah. Let's save Cream already."

And the two of them followed the CEL's directions down a big green slope, and according to the handy little machine, they were really close to Eggman's base by now.

* * *

**I hope that you'll give this story a chance; it really makes me really happy! I'd love some feedback ;) Thanks!**


	3. Eggman's Base

**Eggman's Base**

_Finally_ they were there.

They had been walking for a whole day and half the previous night before they were forced to sleep under a big oak and endure the chilly dark of the night, and as soon as the dawn arrived this morning, they'd immediately set off again on stiff legs. They'd walked across fields, through woods and nearly drowned in a flowing river, as if the creepy canyon hadn't been enough.

But now they were there: Eggman's current base was far away and well hidden from the Mobians, covered by a couple of tall cliffs beneath a high hill and a small mountain behind. It looked pretty much the same as it always did; the same laboratory themed large metallic building, full of the doctor's ugly face symbols.

And somewhere inside were Cream, and probably a whole massive amount of Eggman's odd robot creations.

"Alright." Tails interrupted her thoughts where he stood with the CEL in his hands. "Let's sneak down."

Amy nodded and they quietly pattered down the slope and crossed the line to the base. Soon they were just outside the solid walls, constantly hiding and sneaking past the useless robots that probably were supposed to guard this place.

Of course there was a main entrance, but only a simpleminded fool would pick that way, so instead they targeted one of the minor entrances where the security wasn't that severe. But even there you needed to enter a code to get inside using a fancy keyboard. But that's why any bright person would bring their ingenious fox-friend.

"Can you get us inside?" Amy whispered as she constantly shot glances over her shoulder to see if they were spotted; the robots were stupid, but not so stupid that they wouldn't come back here in a while.

"Sure, but I'll need some time," Tails replied quietly as he started pressing buttons and finger on the mouse.

_Well, maybe we don't _have _that much time. _Amy could hear the robots simultaneous steps and couldn't help but to get a little nervous. "Tails…" she said warningly.

"I can't work faster!" he hissed, clearly under stress.

By now the robots had rounded the corner, and some of them had spotted the two intruders and to Amy's horror they were on their way. "Tails, they're coming!" she said loudly.

"I'm working as fast as I can!" Tails exclaimed, and drops of sweat were trickling down his temple by now. "We don't have enough time…"

Amy thought fast, and then she bit her lip before she came to the simple and only conclusion: "No worries, I'll buy you some!" she said and pulled out her large Piko Piko Hammer. She prepared herself to fight and positioned herself in a taunting way in front of the robots that were closing in fastly, and she gave them a long glare. "Don't you dare interfere when we're in the middle of a rescue!"

Most of the robots had noticed them by now, and they were rushing towards them, and Amy did the same with her hammer poised; she let out a roar and took a big leap into the robot crowd and swung her hammer as if her life depended on it… which it did.

"Amy, are you okay?!" she could hear Tails call from the closed entrance.

"I'm fine, you just focus on getting the damn door open!" Amy shouted back without stopping in hitting the metallic creatures that were surrounding her.

"Uh… right!" came Tails reply, but Amy was too busy fighting the robots to hear him.

"Goddammit," Amy snarled as she fought, "you – are –", she hit one on the head, "persistent – as—", the head flew away and she hit another one in the belly – or whatever – "HELL!" She spun herself and the hammer around in a fierce tornado move and sent at least six bots in a row flying into the wall and fall motionless and broken to the ground before she attacked the others. "I can keep this up all day if you want me to!" she threatened loudly.

Not that she expected them too, but the robots paid no attention to her taunts, but instead they shot laser beams at her. "Why, you…!" Amy gripped the handle of her hammer tightly and prepared to jam right through them. "RRRHHAAAAHHH!"

_CRAASH!_

"…. Almost, almost, almost, almost…" Tails muttered as he pressed the buttons on the keyboard for dear life. "… Done!" he pressed enter and the entrance immediately opened as response, but when he turned around to call out for Amy to stop it and get inside, the robots were already lying in a broken pile of steel behind her.

The pink hedgehog triumphantly spun her hammer in the air, winked and victory posed: "That's what you get," she said and stepped on one of the robots' heads as she returned to Tails. "How about that?" she asked proudly.

"Wow…" came Tails' reply as he observed his friend and the robot pile. "… Sometimes I'm just happy that you're on my side and not the enemy's…" He turned around and started to walk inside. "Sonic should really give you a chance someday."

"I know, right?" Amy cooed and indifferently adjusted her headband before she followed him inside the building.

* * *

"So, now that we're inside, the CEL won't show us exactly _where _in the base that Cream is?" Amy asked as they walked – very carefully – in a long, empty corridor.

"That's right," Tails said as he stopped to peek around a corner for enemies. "So we'll have to find her ourselves."

"Well, that's a pain," Amy sighed.

"I know, and it's dangerous too, but what other choice do we have?"

He was right, of course he was. The two of them sneaked past robots and walked up stairs and corridors for quite a while, before they located a big open door to a big room that by the looks of it seemed to be of greater importance, which could be the cells.

But Amy's expectations were crushed when they entered and found themselves in a big room full of keyboards, computers and control systems instead of the cells.

"Naww, this isn't where they keep the prisoners," Amy said disappointedly as she looked around.

"Maybe not," Tails replied and walked inside, up to one of the greater computer screens and positioned himself on one of the chairs. "But I think that from here, I might be able to hack into the system and find them."

"Oh," Amy said. "I suppose that could work."

She looked around a bit more, and then she just stood and pulled her skirt somewhat restlessly on the spot. "So… what should I do?" she asked after a while. "Do you need help with anything?"

"Oh, no, I'm fine," Tails replied without taking his eyes from the big screen. "This won't take long, so don't worry…"

"Ok," Amy answered. _Tails is really busy right now, I shouldn't bother him. But what should I do while he's working? _She turned to her friend. "I'll just have a look-around," she said.

"Mhm…" Tails didn't seem to be listening, so Amy headed outside with cautious steps, careful not to disturb Tails as he downloaded and edited and hacked and did his complicated technology stuff that Amy would probably never fully understand.

She wouldn't be gone long enough for him to worry, and she wouldn't go that far either; she would be back before he was done. But she just wasn't patient enough to sit around and do nothing in a base full of enemies and doctors… and a kidnapped friend.

* * *

She walked the corridors for a while, careful not to cause a commotion or to open the wrong doors or enter the wrong rooms. _But wow, this place is pretty big, _she thought as she walked. _Maybe I should've stayed put with – huh…? _

Amy stopped at once and perked her ears at the next corner which turned to the right; there were two persons talking just around that corner.

Amy quickly covered her mouth with her hands so that she wouldn't make a sound, and for a second she considered sneaking away and head back to Tails… but now that she thought about it, she was curious to find out who those people were, and what they were talking about. Who knows, maybe she'd actually find out something useful? So she didn't run away, but pressed herself against the wall and carefully, slowly and really quietly moved herself closer to the corner's edge, without revealing herself of course.

She already recognized one of the voices as Eggman's, but she was really not sure how to react when she cautiously peeked around the corner to see that the doctor talking to a hedgehog whom she had not seen or heard of in quite a while: Shadow.

_Shadow…? _Amy blinked several times in confusion. _What is he doing here…? Has he joined forces with Eggman again?_ Her question was automatically answered as she eavesdropped on their conversation:

"… and then when you've fetched me all the Chaos Emeralds and I have used them for my ultimate weapon to take over this world, I'll give you your share of the prize: The Chaos Emeralds. Got it?" It was Eggman who spoke. "I don't see why you get so worked up; a great man and scientist like me _always _keep his promises."

"Yes, doctor," Shadow replied. "I've soon got all of the Chaos Emeralds, so you'll be able to use your weapon soon enough."

Eggman gave him a wide and creepy smile. "Good," he approved sluggishly.

Their conversation seemed to be over, so Amy decided that she was done here. As quietly as possible she turned around and started padding her way back. _This is terrible, _she thought and cast a glance over her shoulder to see if she was followed. _If Eggman has convinced Shadow to work with him to revive that weapon or whatever, then it'll be really difficult even for Sonic to stop them. _

_I'd better get back to Tails and tell him about this, and then we will figure out a plan to save Cream and hide the Chaos Em…, _she didn't get the chance to finish the thought, because as she turned her head forwards, a freakin' super creepy spider mutant robot appeared out of nowhere (it was small, but Amy did _not_ care for bugs) and before she was able to stop herself, she let out a shocked, high-pitched squeal that probably every single person in this part of the lab could hear… and unfortunately, those two persons were the ones that she least of all wanted hot on her heels.

She quickly pressed both her hands against her mouth, but it was way too late for that; "What was that?" she could hear Eggman say.

_Time for me to run, _Amy told herself and set off as fast as her legs would carry her. She didn't need to hear Eggman order Shadow to follow her to realize that he already would. She very well knew how fast Shadow was, and that she only had seconds to make up her mind before he would've caught up.

_Alright, I need to hide _immediately! Amy's thoughts rushed and almost without thinking, she flinged herself to her left and around a corner, hopped behind a couple of steel barrels and didn't make a noise; she listened keenly for Shadow's steps, and when she'd heard him swoosh pass, she could finally breathe again.

"Oh dear god, that was close," Amy sighed exhaustedly and leaned against the wall. "Thank you, barrels."

After she'd caught her breath, she rose and peeked around the corner; she saw a hint of Shadow's black spikes before he disappeared to the left. Amy set off as well, but forward. She would head back to Tails now, and this time she would be a little more careful.

Amy reached the Control Room in mere minutes, but she didn't make it as much as two steps inside and open her mouth to say "Ta—" before Tails ran straight into her from inside, ; there was a crash before he was able to yell "Am—" and they both stumbled backwards in opposite directions.

"Oww… There you are, Amy!" Tails exclaimed as he steadied himself. "I noticed you'd disappeared and I got worried…"

"I know, I'm sorry for just running off," Amy interrupted impatiently, "but you have to listen to this:" and she quickly told him about Eggman and Shadow – though she didn't mention when she messed up because of a tiny bug – and Tails listened patiently throughout all of it.

"That is really not good," he said when she had finished. "Shadow's working with Eggman again? This is bad news…"

"Bad? It's terrible! What are we going to do, Tails?"

Tails' eyebrows sank into a deep and thoughtful frown. "Hmm… I wonder what kind of thing Eggman promised Shadow in order to get him over on his side," Tails muttered. "It's not like Shadow to cooperate only for the sake of majority."

"I have no idea, and honestly, I don't really care about that right now," Amy replied; she was starting to get worked up. "What should we do?"

Tails was silent for a few seconds before he answered: "I think we'll just have to try to take it easy."

"'_Take it easy'?!_" Amy exclaimed. "I'm sorry, Tails, but I don't see how you take it easy in a serious situation like this."

"That's my point," Tails replied. "It's just like in situations like this that you need to keep calm and take it easy." He hopped up on one of the chairs and waved Amy along. "You know, I've checked some of Eggman's files," he began.

Amy walked beside him and looked up at the wide screen. "Really? Did you find something out?" she asked.

"You could say that," Tails replied and hacked into a couple of Eggman's files. "You see, if you are to trust these saved files, then Eggman has been preparing a telepathic speech that is to be performed by a hologram of himself, on all the technologic TV screens etc. in our world."

Amy followed this far. "Uh-huh, so he's going to have a speech?"

"That's right, and I've looked into it too…" Tails brought up a long text message on the screen. "And it would seem like Eggman is going to threaten everyone in our world by taking Cream as a hostage," he explained as he scrolled down to the end of the message. "After what you've told me, I am not almost 100% sure that Eggman is going to let the whole world find out that he's captured Cream, and we probably won't get her back until we do what he wants."

"But," Amy said hesitantly. "He can't take over the world yet, can he? I mean, we've still got one of the Chaos Emeralds, so he won't be able to use his ultimate weapon or whatever."

"Well, you see, that's where he's outsmarted us," Tails said. "You see, even if we have one of the Chaos Emeralds, Eggman is probably only going to threaten to kill Cream unless we give it to him. It's possible that he'd already counted with us to have one the Emeralds, and that might be the main purpose for kidnapping Cream in the first place; to make sure that he has the advantage."

Amy hated to admit it, but Tails was probably right. She did not like the thought of being outsmarted by a fat, crazy fuzzy-moustache scientist.

"But that's why it's lucky that we are here," Tails continued optimistically when Amy didn't answer. "We are here right now, so we can save Cream and prevent Eggman from succeeding in his world domination project!"

Amy blinked a few times, and a smirk even appeared on her lips. _That's right, _she thought. "So then, do you know where Cream is?" she suddenly asked as she remembered the sole purpose of being here.

"Oh, uh…" Tails got back into action and brought up a map on the screen. "Y-yeah, I think I know exactly where she is."

Amy gazed at him; she was _really _happy to finally hear some good news. "Well then, good!" she exclaimed. "Shall we get going?"

Tails nodded. "Sure, I'm just gonna shut these things off," he added and removed all the sites.

Which reminded Amy: "Oh yeah, Tails? I've been wondering this for a while now," she said. "How come the security alarm hasn't called yet?" She'd expected to hear the _"Intruder alert! Intruder alert!" _any second now.

"Oh," Tails simply replied. "That's because I shut it off."

… Of course. Why was she even concerned about stuff like that? "Tails, I've told you this before, and I'm telling you again: You are a _genius!" _she beamed at him.

"Amy, don't say that! You're flattering me," Tails said embarrassedly and looked away so that she wouldn't see his fierce blush. Naww, the cutey creature. Amy was still beaming at him when he finally turned around.

"O-okay then… shall we go?" he said after clearing his throat and straightened himself.

Amy nodded. "Yeah."

And they exited the big room and followed Tails' instructions through a couple of corridors and down a long staircase; down, down, down, down. Down in a huge basement full of cages and cells.

"This was kind of obvious, now that I think about it," Amy muttered to herself. "We should've checked here first of all."

But Tails wasn't listening, because he'd discovered the poor frightened rabbit whom they'd been searching for all along: "Cream!" he whispered and set off towards one of the cells.

Amy reacted quickly and followed him; the next second the two of them were gazing at their friend through the metal bars. "Cream!" Amy almost exclaimed, but she made sure not to make the same mistake as before and make loud noises.

The little rabbit looked up on them, first with confusion, and then her eyes widened and you could literally see the happiness glow out of them; "Amy! Tails!" she exclaimed with her light voice. "You found me!"

"Don't worry, Cream! We'll get you out of there in a second. Back off," Amy said warningly and took out her Piko Piko Hammer; but Tails stopped her with a horror-struck face.

"What are you doing, Amy?! You can't use your hammer, it'll cause too much noise!" he hissed. "And please keep your voices down…"

"How are we gonna get her out then?" Amy retorted. "We've got to hurry, or else Shadow or Eggman will find us!"

"Don't worry," Tails said reassuringly and to Amy's surprise, he took out another small machine from his tails or whatever; this one looked like some kind of multicolored gun.

"What's that?" Amy asked. "Since when did you join the army?"

Tails ignored her. "This is my Power Tool," he explained. "It's very handy since it's small, and it can do a lot of stuff too, although it's not that powerful. But I always keep it with me." He turned to Cream and pointed it at the bars. "It's a laser beam; don't worry, it's not gonna blow the place up."

Amy still wasn't sure if she could trust the suspicious little thing; but she trusted Tails completely, so she managed to refuse the urge to cover her ears in case something would explode. But the small laser beam that shot out of the edge when Tails'd pulled the trigger was not explosive at all; it was a thin laser beam that easily burned the metal and cut a hole in the bars, big enough for someone as small as Cream to fit in it.

"There," Tails smiled. "Now you can come out, Cream."

And their friend didn't linger five seconds in the cell, and as soon as she was out she ran into their arms, eyes full of tears of joy. "_I was so scared…" _she sobbed into Amy's shirt. "Thank you _so much _for saving me…! I'm so sorry that I got caught and messed things up for you…"

"It's alright now, Cream, it's alright," Amy comforted and patted her gently on her head. "Don't worry… We'll be out of here soon, you'll see…"

"Amy's right," Tails gave Cream a comforting smile. "Soon we'll be outside, and then we'll head back home…"

Cream nodded repeatedly and tried to stop sobbing. "Okay…"

"Come on, let's go," Tails said and grabbed Cream's hand. "We've got to tell Sonic about Eggman's plan."

"Really?"

All three of them froze.

Amy swallowed hard; you couldn't mistake that voice for anyone. She slowly turned around, and when she looked up, she saw Shadow standing on top of the staircase, gazing down at them with his red eyes; he looked really mighty and dangerous from up there.

He gave them a dark look; "You'll have to get to Sonic before you can tell him, and that I'm afraid I cannot let you do."

* * *

**R&R? Next chapter will be uploaded soon.**


	4. Unexpected Outcome

**AN: For those who might've wondered: I forgot to mention that Cheese was left behind with Vanilla, in case you're confused about that she wasn't with Cream when Tails and Amy found her. I didn't watch myself and I forgot to write it; unforgivable. Really sorry about that! I'll change, I promise! It will never happen again, you have my word! =(**

**Now excuse me for blabbering and please continue reading the story^^ Love y'all :3**

* * *

**Unexpected Outcome**

"You'll have to get to Sonic before you can tell him, and that I'm afraid I cannot let you do."

The atmosphere immediately tensed up as he spoke, and Amy swallowed nervously. _Shadow, _she thought, and her heart beat faster. _He caught up after all. Dammit… What do we do now?_

"I-it was him," Cream suddenly stuttered. "He was the one who kidnapped me…"

Amy blinked down at Cream before she looked up at Shadow, eyes wide. _What? Shadow's the one who kidnapped Cream? _But she didn't have time to worry about that now though, because Shadow was walking down the stairs.

_Shit! _Amy felt the panic attack her sanity; "What do we do?" she held Cream in a firm grasp as the child hid her face in Amy's shirt once again. "Tails, what do…?" she began, but trailed off as she turned and looked at her friend.

To her surprise, he was pointing the Power Tool at the black hedgehog with a confident look on his face as he exclaimed: "You shouldn't mess with a fox with a Power Tool!" and he pulled the trigger: The next second, a white beam shot out of the edge with a buzzing sound straight towards Shadow; Amy and Cream gasped and even Shadow seemed to be caught by surprise as she beam hit him straight in the chest, and after a few confusing and painfully slow seconds – Amy almost thought that the beam didn't have any effect – Shadow suddenly got stiff, and his body got pale and white; and before they knew it, Shadow looked just like a statue version of himself: White as ice and completely motionless.

"The power of my Particle Freezer beam," Tails said triumphantly.

Amy was impressed and relieved and confused at the same time; "Wow, Tails, that was awesome! You got him!" she exclaimed.

"Good work, Tails!" Cream smiled happily.

Though Tails suddenly didn't look so triumphant anymore as he turned to them with a slightly concerned look on his face now; "We don't have much time, you guys," he said. "The Particle Freezer's effect depends on how strong the particles that it freezes are, and by knowing Shadow's power, it won't last for long; he'll soon break free. We need to get going!"

Cream looked bewildered, and so was Amy, but she simply nodded in agreement and set off up the stairs with her friends hot on her heels; they passed Shadow and ran as fast as they could towards the exit. For some reason, the way out seemed a lot faster than the way in as they reached an exit in merely ten minutes, and this time Amy ran ahead and busted the thick metal door open with her hammer; there was no time for cautiousness anymore.

They darted outside, slid down a small slope and hit everything that ended up in their way; mostly the robot nuisances. They ran and ran, didn't look back nor sideways, but simply sprinted forward and they didn't stop until they were far, far away from the base.

They collapsed on the ground under the oak which Amy and Tails had used as shelter as they slept the last night, and there they just lay exhausted for a long, long while, taking fast and rasping breaths; they were completely done up and out of energy.

"That – _hahh – _was_ way _too close… _hahh," _Amy panted where she laid face flat to the ground.

"Yeah… _hahh… _I know," Tails replied. "I think I… _hahh… _almost swallowed my tongue…"

"I'm so happy that we're out of that awful place," Cream said weakly. "I'm tired of being kidnapped."

Amy almost chuckled; "Don't worry about that, Cream," she said encouragingly. "This might sound weird, but it was totally worth it, going to the base."

Tails sneered. "Yeah, and we left with both Cream and a Chaos Emerald."

Cream sat up and her jaw almost fell to the ground. "A Chaos Emerald?!" she squeaked. "You found a Chaos Emerald?!"

"Yeah," Amy replied as she rose with the help of the trunk of the oak. "We'll tell you later. But right now, we need to get back and tell Sonic and the others about Eggman's plan."

They were all tired, but they knew that they couldn't afford to waste any more time, so Tails and Cream got to their feet as well, and they set off home.

It took them three days to get home, with their aching limbs and empty stomachs; luckily they came across several rivers so that they wouldn't dehydrate to death, and somehow they managed to keep it up all the way, with as few breaks as possible. Cream was the only one who seemed to regain all her energy as they finally reached her house where Vanilla was standing in the garden, taking care of the flowers; she'd probably stayed up ever since they left.

"Mom!" Cream managed to squeal before her voice broke, and when Vanilla lifted her head and opened her mouth in shock, grief and indescribable relief and happiness, Cream sprinted towards her as fast as her slender legs would carry her; she ran straight into her mom's arms with the tears flowing down her cheeks, and then suddenly an overjoyed Cheese appeared out from the window and flew straight towards them and joined the embracing, and the three of them didn't let go of each other in a long, long while.

"Naww," Amy sighed mellifluously. "That is so lovely…"

Tails just smiled.

The two of them walked up to Cheese, Cream and her mother who had finally released each other, and as Cheese happily circled around Cream's head, Vanilla turned to look at Tails and Amy with watery eyes and simply shook her head slowly. "I don't know what to say," she whispered.

"You don't need to," Amy replied gently, and gave Vanilla a smile which she gladly returned.

"Thank you for saving me," Cream said in her place.

Amy was about to reply "no problem" or something as such, when she suddenly remembered that they kind of were in a hurry; Shadow might already be coming for their Chaos Emerald.

"I'm sorry for being rude, but do you have any idea of where Sonic might be? We need to talk to him, it's urgent!" Amy said instead, desperately trying to conceal the impatience in her voice.

To her disappointment, Vanilla just shook her head. "I'm sorry, dear. It was a long time ago since I last saw him, and as much as that boy runs around…"

"I understand," Amy said, but it was difficult to conceal her disappointment. Then she turned to Tails; "Have you any idea where he might be? Or where Shadow might look first?"

Tails crossed his arms and frowned. "I have no idea where Shadow might strike first, but regarding Sonic…" he observed a fairly large bug crawl over the grass in front of his feet. "He might be at the Chaotix'…"

"The Chaotix'?" Amy frowned skeptically. "Why would he be at the Chaotix'?"

"It was just an idea…"

They fell silent.

"He might be with Mr. Knuckles," Cream suggested.

Amy and Tails just looked at the ground for a while before they simultaneously raised their heads and stared at each other. … Of course. Obviously he was at Angel Island. "Thanks Cream, you're a genius," Amy praised. "Come on, Tails, let's go!" she ordered impatiently and then set off without waiting for a response.

"H-hold on, I'm coming!" Tails called after her.

"But are you sure you should leave immediately? You're all bruised up and exhausted, and probably starved too," Vanilla pointed out worriedly. "Don't you want to come inside for some food first?"

"I'm sorry, but I don't think we have time for that," Tails apologized as politely as he could. "But we'll definitely join you guys later. Take care, you two!" he said to Cream and Vanilla before he followed Amy. "Amy, _wait for me!"_

"Be careful!" Cream called after them, and she and her mother waved them off as they disappeared out of sight.

* * *

Sonic were talking to Knuckles who – like always – was by the Master Emerald's side when they heard Tails' and Amy's calls in the distance; "_SoooonniiIIIIICC!" _The yells grew louder as the pink hedgehog and the two-tailed fox came running towards them – it was amazing how they'd managed to keep it up ever since Cream got kidnapped – and soon they were standing by the stone platform that held up the Master Emerald, where Sonic an Knuckles were looking down at them with confused faces.

"Huh? Tails? Amy?" Sonic blinked at them. "Hey guys, what are you doing here?"

Amy had been fully prepared and had thought about nothing else than to tell Sonic about all of the recent events and about what had happened, but now that he was standing a few meters away from her like nothing had happened at all, she almost wanted to slap him. "We've been looking _all over _for you!" she exclaimed furiously. "And while you and Knuckles have been sitting around doing nothing, Cream was in real danger and—"

"Amy, we can yell at Sonic later," Tails interrupted with a gentle hand on her shoulder. "But that's not what's important right now."

Amy opened her mouth to protest, but then she closed it. Tails was right. Instead of barking at them, they should tell Sonic and Knuckles the news.

"What's happened, you two?" Sonic asked and jumped down from the platform, and even Knuckles had moved from the Master Emerald by now.

Amy took a deep breath, and then she and Tails told them everything. Amy didn't really know what she'd expected, but when they were finished, Sonic seemed to be really impressed.

"Wow, you saved Cream by yourselves? That's great! Plus, you found a Chaos Emerald and hindered Egghead's plans," he exclaimed and gave them a proud and approving thumbs-up. "Good work! Really."

"Yeah, but I really find it hard to believe that they actually managed to escape from Shadow," Knuckles remarked. "I hate to admit it, but that freak is really frickin' powerful."

Amy irritably stuck her tongue out at him, and Tails muttered something about "you have no idea."

"Always the optimistic one, eh, Knuckles?" Sonic sneered.

"I'm just stating facts," Knuckles retorted defensively. "I mean, it's a girl and a kid we're talking about here."

Amy was about to snap something harsh at him, but Tails spoke instead; "That's alright," he said with great self-control before he turned to all three of them. "More importantly, what should we do now?"

"You give the Chaos Emerald to me."

They all spun around, and who did they find standing a few ten meters away on a rock, if not Shadow the Hedgehog himself?

"How the hell did you get here?!" Knuckles exclaimed.

You couldn't miss that to Knuckles' great annoyance, Sonic smirked at their visitor. "Hey, Shadow! Long time no see. S'up?"

And indeed Knuckles groaned irritably; "God, Sonic, you make me _sick _with your casual gully-goo lazy freakin' attitude!" he spat. "Let's just beat this guy up!"

Shadow acted as if he hadn't heard a word of what the red echidna just said. "Make it easy for yourselves and give me the Chaos Emerald," he said, and the calmness in his voice was scary, "or take the hard way and suffer."

Knuckles' eyebrow twitched in frustration. "Never! We won't give it to you no matter what you do!" he snarled.

"Be careful what you say," Shadow replied coolly, and the next second before Amy knew it, Shadow had disappeared.

Amy was struck by surprise and looked from right to left; where did he go? She opened her mouth to ask Sonic and the others, but at that moment, Shadow appeared in front of her and the words stuck in her throat. When she ordered her body to move, it was already too late; Shadow landed a punch straight in her stomach that sent her flying into a tree before she sank to the ground.

She could hear someone yell her name, but she didn't know who it was since her head was dizzy and foggy and everything became a blur; she started seeing black dots in front of her face and slowly lost consciousness. She staggered in between unconsciousness and reality; every now and then she caught dim glimpses of what was happening in front of her in between the blackouts:

She thought she saw a figure lay on the ground; by the beige, orange-like looks of it, it could be Tails. Meanwhile, Sonic and Knuckles seemed to be yelling and shouting at Shadow, but Shadow's responses were like distant murmurs in Amy's ears; but very slowly she regained her hearing ability and was able to understand part of the conversations;

"… believe what… done, Shadow…" That was Sonic.

"… warned you," was Shadow's reply, and then Knuckles called him something like "crazy" and "psychopath." But after that, the voices started to become distinct to Amy's ears.

"We'll never give you the Chaos Emeralds, you'll only give them to Eggman!" Sonic's voice sounded distant, but she heard what he said.

"No." To her surprise, that was what Shadow replied. _"No"…? What does he…? _Amy tried to move her body but that only confused her mind, and when she tried to say something, it ended up like something between a groan and a murmur. She listened to Shadow instead, hoping to get an explanation.

"I only told Eggman that I would give him the Chaos Emeralds so that he would give me their location; I never intended to let him have them. I've got my own plans."

Sonic seemed to be just as confused as Amy. "What do you mean?" he asked. "Are you planning to rule Mobius yourself?"

"No, I don't," Shadow said. "But I won't tell you. Right now, my only goal is to gather all the Chaos Emeralds, and I'll make it happen with or without your help," he added coolly. "But I don't think you would put your dear friends in that kind of danger, would you?"

It worked. Sonic hesitated, but after a while, he slowly handed over the white Chaos Emerald.

"That's what I thought," Shadow said, and there was something weird about his tone as he said it. "I'll be back for the rest," he said before he lifted the Chaos Emerald up above his head. Then there was a flash of light, and the next second, he was gone.

Amy managed to lift her head and gazed at the spot where he'd disappeared. "Just what the heck…?"

Sonic stood motionless for a while before he turned to look at his friends, and he must've noticed that she was conscious, because he scurried over to her. "Amy! Are you alright?"

Amy shook her head and immediately regretted it; the world was spinning. "How's Tails?" she asked weakly.

"They're alive," Sonic replied. "Don't worry, me and Knuckles will take you back to Cream's house…" Sonic said something else too, but Amy didn't catch it, because the drowsiness was returning and she just felt really, really tired…

* * *

When Amy woke up, she was indeed at Cream's. After she'd confirmed that the others were alright, she finally managed to eat the food that Vanilla had served her, and when she'd began, it was almost impossible to stop; she'd forgotten that she was starving.

After everyone had had something to eat and drink, Tails was the one who finally asked the question that had probably been bothering all of them: "So, what do we do now?"

Everyone was quiet. And to their surprise, Sonic was the one who broke the silence, and the words that came out of his mouth surprised them even more: "I don't think that we should do anything at all.

They all just stared at him. "Do nothing?!" Amy exclaimed. "What do you mean, 'do nothing'?! Have you lost your mind?!"

But Sonic just smiled confidently. "Don't worry. We don't know for sure that Shadow's going to use the Chaos Emeralds for some evil and wicked purpose; to be honest, that doesn't sound like the kind of thing Shadow would do at all."

Amy blinked; now that she thought about it, he was right. She didn't have a good reply to that one…

"That's why I think we shouldn't do anything; at least not until we know what he's up to," Sonic finished, and he actually sounded kind of smartass as he said it. Maybe he was.

"So… you think that we should just take it easy?" Tails asked.

Sonic nodded. "That's right. But of course, if push comes to shove, if shit hits the fan, and if it shows up that Shadow is going to do something totally wicked after all; _then_ of course, we'll be there to stop him! Right, pals?" he added with a big smile and a thumbs-up.

It was quiet for a while, as everyone processed this. Then, Tails returned Sonic's smile and the thumbs-up as well. "Yeah, that's right, pal!" he said happily, and soon the rest of them gave each other the thumbs-up too; except for Knuckles, who merely smiled.

It was only Amy who didn't do the thumbs-up pose. It was not that she thought Sonic was wrong or anything; she thought that her blue hero was absolutely right, just like always.

But there was just something, deep inside her, this strange little feeling that told her that something was about to happen; that this event – that had almost been too much for Amy – was the beginning of something else; something unpredictable and mysterious. Something huge.


	5. A Weird Dream

**I apologize deeply if the last chapter was a little rushed; another bad habit of mine was that I really wanted to publish the chapter, although it was late at night and the chapter wasn't complete, and I continued writing it as fast as I could instead of just waiting till the next morning to complete it… I hope it was readable at least **

**Again, thanks so much to everyone who reads this story, if only this far^^ Reviews and comments are very much appreciated, all kinds.**

**Thanks a lot!**

* * *

**A Weird Dream**

Two weeks had passed since Cream's kidnapping, and everything went so smoothly after that, that Amy almost forgot about it all.

The first days were really lazy; all she'd been doing was to rest and recover from the previous journey, and she even forgot to chase after Sonic during that time. The very first day had been the greatest, because Sonic had actually, _finally, _come by to see if she was alright. Oh, how happy she was! She just wanted to hug and embrace and kiss him and apologize for being angry at him earlier… but that was only the first day. When he realized that she would be just fine, he simply said that it was great and left.

Amy sighed; it was too bad. But frankly, she'd been so exhausted, it was like if all the nights of lack of sleep had returned to her at once; she was not sure if she would've had the energy to be with Sonic in the first place.

But Tails and Cream and came by a lot of times, and Amy enjoyed their company as much as Sonic's, so they always cheered her up. Tails' broken tails had healed incredibly fast, and although they were still somewhat stiff from the lack of use, he could now fly again. And the last few days, they'd been going out on picnics and met up for tea, and all sorts of nice things; as mentioned, things had gone back to normal and went so smoothly that Amy had almost forgotten about Shadow, Eggman, evil plans and Chaos Emerald hunting.

Until one night.

* * *

She was standing on a wide field of grass. To her left, there were a forest; to her right, there was only darkness. Above her, the stars twinkled and in front of her, there was a strong light. Naturally, she headed towards the light; the closer she came, the safer she felt, and the feeling of recognition grew stronger.

As she moved forward, the surroundings darkened, just like if the night was falling, but without a sunset. And without a moon. The only light that existed was the beautiful, warm turquoise light in front of her. She almost thought that she could hear it whisper, deep and softly, but in some ancient kind of language which she couldn't understand.

Amy followed the soothing voice until she reached round stairs that led up to a stone platform, and as she approached the stairs, she felt more than anything that she knew this place. Then, as she was almost there, the light ceased to whisper and was replaced by another voice, only that this voice was even deeper than the previous one, and dark.

_The seven Chaos Emeralds…_

Amy couldn't move. Suddenly, the voice grew in strength and started speaking in a dark and violent language to which her ears wouldn't listen, and it almost seemed to be upset about something. As the voice continued to whisper, hiss, the darkness suddenly opened up a hole around Amy, and the ground disappeared beneath her; she desperately tried to grasp the fading light above her, and tried to understand what the dark voice was saying, but the very last words were the only ones she caught:

_The seven Chaos Emeralds… are found…_

Amy sat up in her bed with a gasp; it took several seconds for her to realize that she had been dreaming. _Just _what_ kind of nightmare was that?_ Amy wondered as she wiped the sweat off of her forehead. _It felt so real too…_

Amy gazed out the window, into the night. Just where was that place? She was sure that she'd been there before… was this one of those "deja vy" visions or whatever people could have? But this one felt different.

She glanced at her watch: 5 am. She rubbed her eyes sleepily before she lay back down and thought about the weird dream for a long, long time, but no matter for how long she tried to, she still couldn't go back to sleep.

* * *

_The next day, Tails' house…_

"… and then, even though I told him that it definitely would rot and wither if he let it stay in the sun, he just waved me off and ignored me," Tails explained as he sat with Sonic, Big, Froggy, Cream, Cheese and of course Amy, by his big coffee table where they'd decided to meet for some good old storytelling and a snack(Big and Froggy had passed the house and were invited to join them.) "He just said that nothing could possibly happen since it was a 'sunflower'."

"That sounded wise to me," Cream remarked with an innocent face. "I mean, isn't that why it's called a sunflower?"

"It's… really not that simple," Tails tried gingerly.

"What a dick," Sonic sneered from his comfy position on the windowsill. "So did the thingy rot, or what?"

"Yeah, it did, so at least he came back to apologize to me the following day," Tails finished the story. "But he was kinda silly, wasn't he?"

"Totally," Sonic laughed.

"I feel bad that his flower withered, though," Cream sighed. "I don't like it when plants die."

"I know. But hey, I actually planted him another one!" Tails said encouragingly, and it made Cream smile and clap her hands before she took a cookie from the plate on the table and swallowed it.

"I love these cookies," she said as she chewed on another one.

"I know, they're delicious," Tails agreed. "And it was Amy who made them, right?" he added and turned to the pink hedgehog to get a direct answer from her.

"Rosey baked the cookies? Is Rosey alright?" Big asked in his incredibly low-pitched voice, when no reply came. "Rosey has been quiet for some time now."

Amy barely heard what he or the others said; she just stared down into her teacup, her thoughts foggy and her mind very distant…

"Amy?"

She snapped out of her thoughts and raised her head. "Yeah?"

She was surprised to find everyone else looking at her. "Amy, are you alright?" Tails asked. "You've seemed a little off ever since I called you this morning."

Amy looked at him with a confused look for a while; then her brain processed what he just said and she shook her head. "I'm fine. I've just not been sleeping that great last night," she said and gave her friends a reassuring smile. Which was true; the dream was still haunting her.

"You sure?" Sonic asked. "When I feel sick, I just go for a run."

"We're talking about people, Sonic, not you," Tails said.

"Ouch."

They burst out in laughter; even Amy chuckled a little. But she was very, very, _very _tired; that dream seemed to have drained all of her energy, and on top of that, it had given her a pair of awful and ugly bags under her eyes. And when her friends had carried on the conversation without her for yet another ten minutes, she rose from her chair. "I think I'm going home," she said as politely as she could. "I'm getting a headache…"

"Sure, Amy," Tails gave her a compassionate smile. "Take care."

"Tell me if you need company and I'll come over," Cream said as she walked to the door, and Cheese approved with a couple of _chao-chao'_s. Amy smiled at them and waved before she opened the door and exited the house. Good god, she was probably gonna go straight back to bed as soon as she got home… even though she was only 18 o'clock.

As she got home, she immediately went to bed, but it took some time for her to go to sleep; she lay and wondered about that place… Fields, trees, a strong light; she was sure that she knew where it was, but she simply couldn't put her finger on it.

She thought about what Shadow had said before he left them on Angel Island: _"I'll be back for the rest." _That didn't really make sense though; he already had all the Chaos Emeralds, didn't he? What was he plotting? Amy sighed as she realized that she had no idea about anything right now.

"I think I'll just try to sleep," she mumbled to herself before she pulled up the sheets and buried her head in the warm soft pillow and let out a deep sigh, like a sleepy puppy, before she fell asleep.

* * *

Amy was standing on the grassy field again; she was in the same place as in the previous dream, with the forest to her left, stars above her and the light up ahead. But this time the darkness was all over the place. The weird thing was that Amy knew that she was dreaming, and _yet _it still felt so unbelievably real.

This time, she wanted to find out where she was; she set off towards the light, this time she was running. Just like in any dream, it still took her a painfully long time to reach the stone stairs, but as she started walking up on them, she noticed something that she hadn't noticed in the previous dream; the shining light was shaped just like a Chaos Emerald, just that it was ten times larger.

_A large Chaos Emerald… _That's when it struck her, and this place suddenly made totally sense: This was _Angel Island!_

Amy slapped her forehead; _that's _why she thought that she recognized this place. So obvious! She looked up at the Master Emerald as she approached the stone platform and listened to its whispers; but now, it sounded frightened.

"Are you scared of me?" Amy whispered, and she slowly reached out to touch the giant gem. But she froze; the atmosphere had suddenly gotten cold, or rather quite freezing. And as the sudden change of atmosphere had occurred, Amy realized that she was not alone in this place; a dark shadow was approaching the Master Emerald, slowly and unconstrained.

Amy felt like air; she felt like she didn't exist in that stranger's eyes, and frankly, she was quite glad that she didn't; the shadow sent anything but friendly signals.

_The seven Chaos Emeralds…_

Amy listened as the dark voice spoke, while the shadow moved closer to the Master Emerald.

_The seven Chaos Emeralds… the Master of them all… _the final word cracked as the shadow reached out for the gem's light; _… Tonight…_

Amy woke up with a gasp; she fumbled for the lamp, tripped and fell out of her bed, hit her elbow and snapped out of the dream. She sat up, eyes wide and sweat trickling down her forehead as she recalled the dream; Angel Island. That stranger was going to steal the Master Emerald from Angel Island, he would sneak past Knuckles and snatch his precious protégé right under his nose; or would he even kill him?

Whatever he was going to do, it was going to occur tonight.

* * *

**Amy doesn't seem to be getting any rest or chance of recovery and relaxing anymore. The poor girl. The strong girl!**

**And sorry if this chapter was a little short; I'll make it up to you in the next one ;)**


	6. The Art of Prophecy

**The Art of Prophecy**

"_Tonight…"_

Tonight. It was going to happen _tonight._ Amy's head and thoughts were spinning, but at least she was able to understand that much, and that was enough for her to realize what she had to do; she had to warn Knuckles! Immediately!

Amy jumped out of her bed, leaving sheets and pillows in a mess behind her on the mattress. She didn't bother to eat breakfast; how could she even think about that right now? She jerked her boots on and hastily put on her red headband; _that _was necessary. And of course she hurriedly dressed herself in her red summer dress and grabbed her precious Piko Piko Hammer before she exited the house.

She sprinted across the green fields as fast as she could; but she knew very well that it would take some time to get to Angel Island by feet. "I don't have time," she panted as she ran. "I need to get to Knuckles _now!"_

"Frooogggyyy!"

The familiar low-pitched voice startled her, but what startled her even more was the frog that flew straight into her face as she looked to her left the moment after.

With a gasp and a high-pitched squeal, Amy stumbled backwards and almost crushed a couple of butterflies and a few ants as she fell to the ground, desperately trying to pull the green slimy creature off her face. "Mmmphh, mhh mhhh! Umph mmhmhm!(Froggy, let go! I'm in a hurry!)" Her words didn't make much sense since she talked into a frog's belly.

It was not until the big purple cat reached her and grabbed the frog to pull it off; along with the frog, he pulled half of Amy's face and all her hair. "IIIIEEEKKHH! Big, _stop! You're ripping my head off!"_

"Huuuuhh?" Big's reaction was not the fastest, and by the time he let go, he had already pulled off the stubborn frog; and of course, a lot of pink strands of hair.

"_Gaaaaggghh!" _Amy whimpered. "For God's sake, Big..! And I have a sore scalp too…!" She covered her head with her hands and carefully rubbed the tender spots. "My god, you're powerful," she muttered as she pinched her eyes close when she pulled off a few loose straws. "But you got the frog out of my face, at least. So, thanks."

"I'm sorry," Big apologized. "Froggy ran away. Again. Then you found Froggy! Froggy likes Rosey. Big likes Rosey too; Big is grateful." He gave Amy a wide smile, which was almost a little creepy when coming from that big cat.

But Amy returned his smile; "That's alright… although it was more likely that he found me… but whatever," she shook her head.

"Where is Rosey going?" Big asked as he tilted his head. "Rosey looked like she was in a hurry."

Amy blinked; _That's right! _Angel Island – the Master Emerald – Knuckles – the stranger – the theft –_ she had to hurry! _Amy's stressed condition returned to her as she quickly got to her feet and looked up at Big. "I'm sorry, but you're right; I'm in a hurry and I really need to get going now!"

Big spoke before Amy'd managed to get going; "Where is Rosey going?" he asked.

Amy turned back to look at him; at first she opened her mouth to send him off or something such, but then she closed it, ashamed of herself for having considered it. Instead she opened her mouth again and said gently instead; "I need to go to Angel Island; something serious is about to happen and I need to warn Knuckles."

She was kind of expecting something like "ooh" coming out of Big's mouth next, but instead he gave her a different, nice kind of look as he opened his mouth once again. "Rosey wants to go to the sky? Then Big will help Rosey, because Rosey helped Big find Froggy," he said.

Amy blinked in confusion; "You'll help me?" To be honest, she didn't really see how Big could possibly help her to get to Angel Island any quicker. But Amy wasn't rude enough to simply wave off his offer, so instead she asked, as politely as possible: "I'm sorry for asking, but… how exactly do you intend to help me..?"

Big responded with one of his wide smiles. "Hold on to my fur," he instructed and pointed a big furry finger at his body.

Amy didn't really know how to react; grabbing onto Big's body was not the thing that she'd be willing to do in normal circumstances, but this wasn't really a normal circumstance now, was it? So instead of protesting in repugnance, she actually obeyed and slowly walked up to Big and grabbed his fur with one hand.

To her surprise, Big gave her a confused look. "You'll fall if you only use one hand."

Amy refused the urge to frown before she took a small hop and grabbed onto Big's massive amount of fur with both arms as well as her legs, just like if she was desperately trying to hug him. It probably looked kind of weird from other people's perspective; luckily, no one was there expect them.

"Good," Big approved pleasantly, and then he bent his legs under him and raised both of his arms above his head, as if he was preparing to take a big leap. Froggy jumped up too and positioned himself on Big's shoulder.

Amy was just starting to feel a little awkward and slightly wondered what Big meant when he said that she might _"fall off", _when he suddenly let out an exaggerating roar and before Amy got the chance to even blink, he'd taken off from the ground with amazing speed, and they darted _upwards._

_Shocked _was the least thing that Amy was now; she let out a screech in shock and terror and surprise and astonishment mixed up together as she now understood what the big cat had meant by his warning, and she clung to his thick fur for dear life. "_GGAAAAAAGGHHH!" _Sexiest scream in hedgehog chick history. "WHAT THE HELL, BIG?!" she screamed as they continued upwards without slowing down. "Since when did you learn how to fly?!"

"Big always could." His deep voice made itself heard even though the grumbling and whistling sound of the winds – that were ten times as strong as usually – and the speed hit them as they darted through the air, through the clouds.

Amy's hair fluttered and lashed fiercely in front of and behind her face; if she wouldn't have been taken by such surprise, she might've been amazed by this. She _was _amazed, but not in an admiring kind of way right now. She couldn't resist to peek down, and as soon as she did, she immediately regretted it; they were as high up as Amy had ever been and would probably ever go without a seatbelt and a sheltering window.

She thought she saw a bird flash by, and maybe even a ship, but they disappeared out of sight as soon as they had appeared, and all the time they just kept going upwards. It felt like they'd left the ground and the even the clouds far, far behind them. Or below them.

Amy didn't have the guts to look upwards, so all she did was to press her face tightly into Big's warm fur. But just as she thought that she would never get to walk on solid ground ever again, the whistling in her ears stopped, and she heard the _thump _sound of something heavy landing on the ground, and a terrified screech of a male (sexiest scream in echidna history), and she looked up. After a few confused blinks and a few wasted attempts to process what had just happened, she realized that they had reached Angel Island; on top of that, they had crashed into the ground right in front of the Master Emerald and a startled Knuckles.

Amy let go of Big and was prepared to call out and run up to her friend, but to her surprise, her legs gave way under her, and with a surprised gasp she would've collapsed, if Big hadn't caught her before she hit the ground. "_Ack! _Phew… Thanks, Big," she said gratefully as he helped her back on her feet, and she gave him a gentle smile. "For that, and for bringing me here." Holy god, it must've only taken about a few minutes.

Big gladly returned her smile. "No problem," he said happily. He opened his mouth to say something else, but Knuckles interrupted him:

"JUST WHAT THE _HELL _WAS THAT?!" he exclaimed completely horror-struck, and pointed an accusing index finger at the two of them; his face expression revealed exactly how startled he was.

Amy very well understood his reaction, but she had no time to explain, and only ignored his question. "Knuckles, we don't have time! You have to listen to me!" she exclaimed and jogged up to him.

Knuckles met her gaze with a questioning raised eyebrow; "What's wrong?" he asked her. "You look kind of pale."

_No shit, _Amy thought but quickly sent that thought away; "Knuckles, please don't think that I'm crazy when I tell you this, but; _someone is going to steal the Master Emerald!" _she exclaimed with a wild face expression. Maybe she shouldn't have been so straight-forward, because Knuckles indeed looked at her as if she was crazy.

"… What?" he said after a while.

"It's true!" Amy burst out. "You have to believe me!"

Knuckles just looked at her for a while. Then he shook his head; "Look Amy, I appreciate that you're concerned about the Master Emerald's safety, but—"

"Knuckles, I'm telling you the truth!" she shouted. "Listen, I had a dream and—"

"A dream?" To Amy's immense dismay, Knuckles skeptically shook his head again, and then he tried to give her a comforting pat on her shoulder for some weird stupid reason. "Tails told me that you've been rather exhausted and absent-minded lately. Now I see what he meant; listen, you're probably just still a little shaken from Cream's kidnapping—"

"No, Knuckles, no!" Amy desperately tried. "No, this is true, I swear…!"

But Knuckles just continued to shake his head; "It was just a nightmare, okay Amy? You're just a little confused—"

"I am _not _confused!"

She glared at him; Knuckles wasn't listening to her, but Amy refused to realize that this was futile; she shook her head from side to side and then gazed almost pleadingly at her stupid friend. "Knuckles, _please…!" _she practically begged for him believe her. "You have to believe me; the Master Emerald…"

Knuckles sighed, and then he actually grabbed her shoulders and turned her around, completely ignoring Amy's frustrated protests; "Knuckles, no! What are you – no! Stop! Stop, Knuckles, _please!" _

Big, who was still there, watched all of this with an unhappy face. "Red should listen to Rosey," he said to Knuckles.

"Stay out of this, Big," Knuckles said warningly as he led Amy away.

Amy continued to shout and tried to break free and convince him that the Master Emerald was in real danger, but it only ended with Knuckles grabbing her arms and holding her still; he turned her around and looked straight into her eyes. "Amy, listen to me," he said determinedly. "It was only a dream."

"But—"

"It was _only_ a dream."

Amy opened her mouth to protest, but for some reason, she froze. Very quietly she closed her mouth and slowly turned and looked down at their feet; maybe Knuckles was right… Maybe it was only a dream after all…

No matter what it was, Knuckles would never believe her. Maybe she was just exhausted or whatever after all… she did not want to think that she was, but maybe it was true?

Amy stood silent for a long, long while before she finally sighed and raised her head to meet Knuckles with depressed and tired eyes. But just as she was about to apologize to him, she was interrupted when Big stepped in between them with a serious face. "No!" he grumbled.

Knuckles backed up; "Big, what the heck are you doing?" he asked, and Amy wondered that too.

But Big only glared down at Knuckles with a very determined face. "Rosey wouldn't lie to you," he said strictly.

To this, Knuckles responded with wide eyes; "What..? Hey listen, it's not that I think that Amy would lie to me, but—"

"Rosey doesn't lie," Big repeated, this time forcefully. "Rosey tells the truth. She only wants to help you."

Knuckles was taken aback; "I-I know that… but…" he hesitated.

Amy looked up at Big with confused eyes. "Big, what are you…?" she mumbled, and Big turned to her instead.

"Rosey is telling the truth, because Big saw strange person collect shiny gems before," he said.

Both Knuckles and Amy stared at him; "_What?" _they exclaimed simultaneously.

Big nodded. "Black hedgehog took shiny gems and said that he was going after the big one, that one," Big pointed at the Master Emerald. "Big knows this is true." He gave Amy a gentle look before he faced Knuckles again with a strict face. "Big knows Rosey is telling the truth."

Knuckles just stood there, shaken by the sudden twist and by the information; he seemed way too taken aback to find an appropriate reply. He just gazed from Amy to Big and looked into their determined faces, and then after a long while, he looked down at the ground in modesty, and Amy was almost sure that he was ashamed of himself as he spoke: "… I'm sorry," he apologized through a murmur. "I'm sorry I doubted you, Amy."

All Amy did was shake her head and give him a faint smile. "It's alright." She was not angry at him; she could agree that her story was kind of unreliable. Unlike Big's, she thought and turned to look up at the big cat with a wide and honestly grateful smile; "Thank you, Big," she said.

Big smiled back. "Big doesn't want Red to think that Rosey is a liar."

His words seemed almost hurtful to Knuckles, and Amy almost felt sorry for him.

"It was good that you stood up for her, Big," Knuckles said after a while, without facing them. "Now I know that the Master Emerald is in danger… thanks to you," he added quietly. "So… thanks."

Both an apology as well as a "thank you", coming from Knuckles in one day; wow. Amy wished she had a video camera. "Don't worry about it," she replied. "So, are you going to stay up all night and guard it?"

Knuckles nodded. "Yeah. I'll ask Sonic to help me out; we can take shifts," he said. "I'll guard it today, he'll take the night, and I'll check on it tomorrow."

"That's a good plan," Amy said. "I'm sure Sonic will help you out." She paused, and then she couldn't stop herself from yawning; "I think I'll be going home now… bit tired…"

Knuckles nodded; "Of course." He gave her an awkward wave as goodbye. "Take care."

Amy waved back, and with that, Big lifted her up and then they took off, and eventually he dropped her off back at her home.

* * *

After Big had left, Amy felt more exhausted and bewildered than ever; she had _no _idea whatsoever what to think or do. So she solved the problem in the same way she'd done last night: She went to bed. And it felt really good, even though it took time for her to fall asleep.

At least the Master Emerald would be safe now, with both Sonic and Knuckles as guards. There was really nothing else she could do, and even if she could, she was not sure if her mind could handle it; it desperately craved sleep right now.

And just as if on command, Amy drifted into deep slumber a few moments later, and this night she slept on without any bothering nightmares.

When Amy woke up the following day and checked her watch, she was surprised to find it saying that she was 11 am. She blinked and rubbed her eyes before she yawned and stretched herself out; that was probably one of the best nights in her entire life. The lack of sleep and the drowsiness were completely gone, and Amy felt more energetic than ever. No nightmares for this hedgehog, not tonight!

Amy smiled a little to herself as she got out of bed and walked out in her kitchen to eat breakfast; three yummy sandwiches with cheese, jam, eggs and cucumbers and a hot cup of tea with sugar and honey in it. It felt really good; after all, she'd skipped breakfast as well as lunch _and _dinner last night.

Amy hummed happily to herself as she gazed out the window and watched a butterfly pass the glass panes; maybe she should call Tails and the others? Yeah, then they could catch up, and she would make it up to them for the time she'd been absent and gloomy.

As soon as Amy had finished breakfast and gotten dressed, she gave Tails a call, and he replied that it would be great if she came over; Sonic and Cream were at his place as well. The thought cheered Amy up even more, and she immediately set off to her friends, arriving at Tail's house in about fifteen minutes.

As she arrived, her friends greeted her warmly and she joined them on the porch where they played games and chitchatted for a long, long time. Everything was great, and everything seemed to go on like that for forever… until a loud and high-pitched scream echoed through the air.

Everyone who sat by the table winced; the loud scream seemed to go on for eternities, but then it finally stopped. No one said anything, but they all thought the same thing; what the heck was that just now?

But just as they were about to continue chatting, another scream was heard, by the same voice; only this time, it was closing in fast, and instead of ust screaming, it bellowed a name: "SsssooooOOOOONNIIIIIIIIIIICCCCCC!"

Amy blinked and spun around on the couch in confusion; she very well knew to whom that voice belonged to. And her idea was confirmed when a roaring Knuckles came charging at them, running almost as fast as Sonic and eyes wild with rage as he bellowed: "SONIC, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU, YOU BASTARD?! I'M GOING TO EAT YOUR SOUL!"

… _What the heck…? _"Knuckles, what's happened? What's the matter?" Amy asked when the furious echidna had reached the house.

He was breathing fast from the run and he was trembling with rage when he finally stopped looking around the house for Sonic and instead faced his confused comrades who watched his every move. His eyes were wild and his face would probably have turned red from anger if it wouldn't have happened to already be as red as it could be, and he must've scared off every single bird, animal and bug from the place as he roared: "THE MASTER EMERALD IS GONE!"


	7. Back to the Base

**Back to the Base**

"_What?!" _Amy exclaimed, and her jaw almost hit the ground. "What did you just say?!"

"You heard me, it's true!" Knuckles burst out. "And I have some business with the responsible one!" He smacked his fists together and his face darkened; he looked kind of evil.

"Uh… you're creeping me out, Knuckles…" Tails stammered slowly.

But Knuckles wasn't listening. "Where is So…" he trailed off to stare at something behind them.

Amy turned around and saw Sonic come out of the main door; his usual smile on his lips like always. "Sorry, natural causes," he sniggered. "Huh?" He stopped when he noticed Knuckles. "Hey, Knux! What's up, you look kind of edgy. Something happened?"

A chill went through Amy's body and she swallowed as she turned around to see the echidna's reaction; Knuckles face had turned deep red, and she almost thought that he was having a heart failure as he started trembling at the sight of the blue hedgehog. "THERE YOU ARE YOU LITTLE BITCH!" he roared and darted up to Sonic in a flash, pushing him up against the wall.

"Ah—Sonic!" Amy exclaimed, but before she could rush to his aid, Tails and Cream grabbed her and held her back. "Knuckles, get your hands off—"

"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING LAST NIGHT, SONIC?!" Knuckles roared straight into Sonic's face, and there were only a few centimeters interval between the two. "I TOLD YOU TO WATCH THE MASTER EMERALD WHILE I WAS GONE, DIDN'T I?! I TOLD YOU TO WATCH IT! WHY THE HELL WEREN'T YOU THERE?!"

To Amy's amazement, Sonic kept his casual expression; he didn't seem that affected by Knuckles' outburst, even though he was breathing harshly straight into his face. Sonic seemed to be recalling that event, and after a while he suddenly blinked as if he remembered; "Oh yeah, that," he said and innocently looked upwards. "I forgot."

Knuckles seemed to have stopped breathing, and this time Amy _really _thought that he was having a heart failure; he just glared into Sonic's face, eyes wide, empty face expression and pupils the size of two dots. He was really creeping her out now.

There was an uncomfortable silence.

"Sonic…" Tails began warningly, but he didn't make it far before Knuckles spoke, very quietly:

"You…" he said, still staring into nothing. "You forg…." The next moment, he exploded: "HOW THE HELL CAN YOU FORGET SUCH A THING, YOU SIMPLEMINDED BRAINWASHED BLUEBERRYHEAD?! ARE YOU FAHKING KIDDING ME?! HOW FREAKIN' BRAINPOPPED CAN YOU POSSIBLY GET?!" He was banging Sonic against the wall now.

"Calm down, Knuckles, we can just take it back," Sonic said as he let the furious maniac slam him over and over again against the wooden house. "It's alr—"

"IT IS _NOT _ALRIGHT, SONIC!"

"Knuckles, _calm down!" _Tails exclaimed in horror. "You're scaring Cream and Cheese! And you're breaking my house!"

"Mr. Knuckles, please stop," Cream stammered from behind Tails' back. "Sonic didn't mean to—"

At that moment, Amy broke free from Tails' grasp and launched herself at Knuckles; "Get away from Sonic, Knuckles! I know he's an idiot sometimes, but no one except _me _is allowed to have that kind of physical connection with him!" Amy claimed loudly and pulled Knuckles away from the blue hedgehog. "Just calm down!" she said irritably as Knuckles tried to break free; "I promise you we'll get the Master Emerald back, Knuckles! We'll help you, so take it easy!"

That seemed to have reached Knuckles' ears, and after a while he actually stopped struggling. "Good," Amy let out a relieved sigh and let go of him.

"Fine," Knuckles muttered. "But if something happens to the Master Emerald," he added with a dangerous tone towards Sonic, "then I'll readjust your face so badly that not even Amy will chase after you anymore."

Amy's eyebrow twitched.

"That's got to be pretty bad," Tails muttered.

"Tails!"

"Sorry."

Amy sighed. "Well, at least we know who stole it," she said optimistically.

"We do?" everyone but Knuckles' said simultaneously.

"Yeah, Big told us that he'd seen Shadow collect the Chaos Emeralds," Knuckles said. "And he said that he was going after the Master Emerald too."

"So it was Shadow after all, huh," Tails frowned and crossed his arms. "I so wonder why…"

Sonic shrugged. "Maybe Rouge has shared her obsession with jewels with him?" he suggested.

Cream laughed, but she was the only one who did. "That's really not funny, Sonic," Tails sighed. "This is serious."

"It's been a long time since I saw that sneaky bat," Knuckles remarked. "Wonder where she is…"

"What, you miss her?" Amy teased.

"Shut up," Knuckles snapped. "Why the hell would I miss someone who only wants to steal my Master Emerald?"

Amy shrugged. "Well, she _is _good-looking… in a modern-fashioned kind of way. And by the way, the Master Emerald is not _yours," _she added. "Even though you're addicted to it."

Tails chuckled. "Yeah, I almost think that we'll have to accept the fact that the Master Emerald is the only one for Knuckles," he said jokingly.

"We're getting off topic," Knuckles said irritably. "We need to focus on getting the Master Emerald back now, and beat the crap out of Shadow. I mean, who knows what he might be doing to it…"

That only sent disturbing images to Amy's brain. But yeah, Knuckles was right; whatever Shadow was up to, stealing the Master Emerald was to cross the limit, and she was pretty sure that they should stop him now.

"And Sonic's idea to take it easy and wait really worked out just freaking great," Knuckles snapped sarcastically.

"Let it go, Knuckles," Tails said. "We don't have time for minor issues like that."

As Tails and Knuckles quarreled, a thought struck Amy; "But if we're gonna stop Shadow, we need to get to him, right?" she said. "And we have no idea where he might be."

Everyone fell silent and looked at her; seemed as if they hadn't thought about that yet. "But we could split up and look for clues," Amy continued hastily, when she feared that she might have crushed everyone's hopes. "Yeah, that's what we do; we split up and ask people if they've seen Shadow, or where they last saw a Chaos Emerald and stuff like that."

After a while, Tails nodded. "I agree, that's a good plan," he said, and soon the others approved too. "Someone can go to the Chaotix'—"

"No thanks," the rest instantly protested, and Tails was left blinking on the spot. "Uh, alright," he said hesitantly. "I guess I'll have to go there myself, then…"

"I can come with you if you want to," Cream offered. "And I'm sure that Mom wants to come too… Vector enjoys her company, and that might mean that he'll tell us more if we take Mom along."

"That's really smart, Cream," Tails said with an impressed smile. "Yeah; me, Cream, Cheese and Vanilla will go to the Chaotix; they _are _detectives after all, so they might be able to help us. The rest of you should go anywhere where you suspect to find any clues," he continued.

Knuckles nodded. "I'll go back to Angel Island," he said. "Might still be some clues there."

Tails nodded. "That's a good idea. What about you, Sonic?" he asked.

"I'll just run around our planet and ask as many people as possible," Sonic replied with a confident smile and jumped over the railing.

Amy acted quickly; "Hey, Sonic, I can go—"

"See ya!" And before Amy was able to follow him, he was gone.

"But I wanted to go with you," Amy said disappointedly as she watched the blue hedgehog disappear out of view. "Why does he always have to do things by himself?"

"That's just who he is," Tails said gently. "And to be honest, he'll probably do the job faster by himself."

"Hey! Are you saying that I would slow him down?!"

"Wha… N-no, that's not what I me—"

"Quit the blabbering you two, and let's just get going already!" Knuckles interrupted impatiently. "I'm off."

Tails turned to him and nodded hastily. "S-sure… see ya…"

Knuckles left, and Amy was left with Tails, Cream and Cheese. "We should probably be going too," Tails said carefully. "Will you be alright, Amy?"

"Of course I will," Amy snorted. "I'll just look around where we might find clues, like you said. You two should get going, and we'll catch up later." She smiled at them over her shoulder.

"Sure," Tails and Cream returned her smile. "See you later, then."

"Bye."

And as Tails and Cream set off, Amy was left alone on the wooden porch. With a short sigh, she sank down on the sofa and thought about where she would go. _Think, Amy, think… where would be the best place to get information on Shadow? _She counted on her fingers all the places she could think of, but it was only the last one that was able to convince her; although she'd rather not go back to that place again: Eggman's base.

Amy swallowed; it was definitely the place that she ought to go to. If she was careful, she might be able to get enough information without even being noticed. But, Amy reminded herself, it would still take at least two days to get there; she didn't have that much time. Unless…

An excellent idea suddenly struck Amy and she got to her feet; of course! Big could help her! _Yeah, Big can help me to get there, with that odd – though awesome – jumping ability of his, _Amy thought excitedly as she ran down the doorstep and away from the house.

_Now then, if I want to find Big, _she thought smartly, _then I'll need to find Froggy first. _She was already counting with the fact that Froggy had escaped from his ungraceful owner. And what do frogs like more than anything, if not water?

So Amy checked on all the nearby ponds which she knew of, and she was lucky; in the third one that she checked, she hit the jackpot: Froggy was swimming in the water. Or at least she thought that it was Froggy, but he was the only frog around, so it was hard to tell… Nonetheless, she waded into the muddy water and managed to snatch up Froggy; usually she didn't like it when she got all dirty, but since her friends depended on her, it was totally worth it.

She got out of the pond and started walking around, calling Big's name, and it didn't take long for him to find her; in just a few ten minutes, he came running towards her with heavy steps, beaming with joy. "Rosey!" he exclaimed in his low-pitched voice as he approached her. "Rosey found Froggy again!"

Amy smiled and handed him the wriggling frog; "I'm glad you found me," she said to the big purple cat as he lovingly cuddled with his little green friend. "I wonder if you, please, can do me a favor again?" she asked sweetly. "I need you to take me somewhere."

To her relief, Big nodded immediately. "Sure," he beamed at her. "Where does Rosey want to go?" he asked as Amy grabbed onto his thick fur.

"A few miles that way," she replied and pointed eastwards. "Do you think you can do it?"

"Of course," Big assured her, and the next moment they were off.

* * *

"Thanks, Big," Amy said as she hopped down on the ground; this time she didn't get as freaked out as last time, and she was able to stand on her own feet directly after the trip. "I promise I'll repay you someday."

"Rosey has already repayed Big," the friendly cat replied. "She has found Froggy several times for him now. But she must be careful now," he added as he looked out over the landscape and towards the big base in front of them; even Big must've realized that this place was not safe. "Big's whiskers tell Big that this place is dangerous."

Amy nodded with a smile. "I know, but I have to be here. Thanks again," she widened her smile and waved him off as he took off up towards the clouds again.

"Bye!" She could hear him call from above before he quickly shrunk into a small dot and then completely disappeared out of sight.

And Amy, who was now all by herself in Eggman's big base, took a deep, lasting breath to dig up her courage, and then marched down the slope towards the large building with resolute steps; she wouldn't fail her friends; she _would _get the information that she came for, no matter what the cost.

It was really easy to promise yourself something like that when you're in a safe place… but once you get _inside _the dangerous place, Amy almost regretted that she came here in the first place; and just to make everything worse, this time the surveillance cameras caught her on tape, and the alarm's mechanic voice repeated: _"Intruder alert! Intruder alert!"_

Amy cursed mentally as she sprinted through the corridors; she had to find a hiding spot, _quick!_ Amy reached a door and tried to jerk it open; locked.

"_Shit!" _Amy ran up to another door and tried the same this; no luck. And with the panic and paranoia rising inside her, Amy sprinted all over the base as fast as she could, until she _finally – _thank _god – _found a door that wasn't locked, and she almost flew inside the room and slammed the door behind her, before she locked it and barricaded it with as much furniture and boxes and – whatever she could find – as she could move, before she pressed her fist into her mouth to shut herself up and listened to the footsteps outside.

Amy's heart hammered in her chest; she closed her eyes and pleaded and prayed to all the Gods and supernatural powers above as she waited. And the guards passed her.

With a relieved sigh, Amy leaned her forehead against the door for a few seconds before she pulled herself together and turned around; just to find a person standing by the opposite wall, that almost caused the poor pink hedgehog to scream, but she managed to stop herself.

Amy shut her eyes and prepared herself for the disaster…. The disaster which didn't occur. Amy carefully opened one eye to peek at the person, and to her surprise she saw that it was only a photo; a very large photo, the size of a normal person, but still only a photo.

"Really? I got freaked out because of a freakin' picture…?" Amy had to give herself a mental lecture. Then she gazed back at the picture to examine it closer; in the foreground there was a pretty human girl with long blonde hair, a blue dress and kind, beautiful blue eyes. Normally it would be difficult for Amy to judge a person's personality and nature just by a picture, but this girl really looked like a very friendly person; sweet and fragile.

Amy wondered who she was, and she wondered even more why Eggman would keep a photo of a cute girl like this in his base? He couldn't possibly be one of those filthy pedophiles or something alike…? _No, wrong thoughts, wrong thoughts, _Amy hastily shook her head and erased those thoughts before she looked around at the rest of the room: It was fairly large with not much furniture – maybe because they were all currently blocking the entrance – and the atmosphere would probably have been very gloomy, if it wasn't for the few pictures and photo's in the room.

Except the large one, there was one on a small table; it was the blonde girl again, happily smiling at the camera, and the frame was carefully and scrupulously decorated with small, pretty pink, red, yellow and blue flowers; the one who put them there seemed to have taken very well care of them, and had probably replaced them a lot of times. Would Eggman do that? No…

But maybe this girl was a relative or something? Amy really wanted to know now, and just as if called upon, she suddenly discovered another photo hanging on the wall, and this one caused Amy to drop her jaw in realization: It was the girl again, but this time she was accompanied by an exact copy of Eggman, only that he looked twice as old, and with a grey moustache and a white laboratory overall that of a doctor's: Gerald Robotnik.

Amy gazed at the photo as she recalled the memories; she had actually seen Robotnik on tape back in Chris' world, when he had decided to destroy the planet Earth to avenge his granddaughter Maria…

Maria. Amy gazed at the girls on the photos: They were all Maria. Maria Robotnik; Gerald Robotnik's beloved granddaughter and Shadow's only friend back at the Space Colony ARK; the girl whom he risked his life for… It must be her. Then, this was Shadow's room?

Amy's guess was confirmed when she observed the last photo, where Maria was seen happily embracing Shadow from behind, and Shadow was actually smirking.

Amy couldn't help but to feel depressed; this poor innocent girl was killed by G.U.N just because she was related to the Project Shadow. _Project _Shadow… the Ultimate Lifeform. Amy crossed her arms and forced herself to think; Maria was killed and Shadow was consumed by hatred, grief and vengeance; he wanted to avenge his late friend, but instead he ended up saving the world because he realized that that was what Maria truly wanted. So, he wouldn't possibly be up to something like destroying nor desolating the world, would he? But then, what did he need the Chaos Emeralds and the Master Emerald for? If only…

"I see you've invaded my base, girley."

Amy spun around, although she didn't need to see the face to realize who had just spoken. The fear returned and grasped her frightened heart as she looked up at the fat doctor whom she really didn't want to meet right now: Eggman.

* * *

**If some of you might've wondered, Big's unique powers were inspired by **_**Totoro :) **_**But maybe some of you already suspected as much? xD**


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